Election 2018

[Bob Butler 54]

(11-12-2018, 08:42 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(11-12-2018, 06:04 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote:

(11-12-2018, 01:51 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: From 2007 and earlier to 2011, the IS was known as Al Qaeda in Iraq.

But it was very weak back then. It only regained real influence after the civil war started in Syria. Some troops left on Syria-Iraq border could easily prevent that.

No, they were powerful enough to largely single-handedly carry out terror attacks that fomented and stoked the civil war in Iraq that the US caused with its invasion. What happened in 2014, 2+ years after the civil war in Syria started, and 3 years after the movement against Assad started, is that this group, now known as the Islamic State, grabbed territory in Syria as well as Iraq because of the chaos and the resulting inability of Assad to rule over the eastern parts of his country.

And further back, Syria was one of the arbitrary colonial states that the major European powers gerrymandered to include as many as possible players within the boundary.  Short term, harder to rebel against.  Today, a lack of stability as various factions try to revert to their old allegiance.  

Currently, Russia is supporting a continued existence for the colonial state, while the various local stake holders try to latch on to their original allegiance with minimal hope of ruling all of Syria.  Those who are trying for modern western values have mostly left, and the West mostly cares about stopping attacks on the West.  Their concerns are not local concerns, and thus there is little loyalty.